USPTO Patents Application 10037067

IN THE CLAIMS

Each claim of the present application is set forth below with a parenthetical notation
immediately following the claim number indicating the current claim status. The Examiner's
entry of the claim amendments, as shown in marked-up form, under Section 1.121 is
respectfully requested.

1. (CURRENTLY AMENDED) A method for identifying destination nodes of a
multicast session in a network having a plurality of nodes, comprising:

forming a physical address queue comprising a circularly linked list further comprising
a plurality of destination node entries each node entry having an associated address for
receiving multicast data;

identifying an address for entering the list at an initial destination node entry;

traversing the linked list for sending the multicast data to the destination nodes ; and

terminating the traversing step prior to reaching the initial destination node entry.

2. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 1 further comprising receiving data intended
for transmittal to the identified destination nodes of the multicast session.

3. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 2 wherein the initial destination node entry is
determined from the received data.

4. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 2 wherein at least one destination node of the
list, as determined from the received data, is excluded from the multicast session.

5. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 4 wherein the received data includes an
indicator identifying the destination node that is to be excluded from the multicast session.

6. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 5 wherein the indicator identifies the
destination node from which the data was received as the destination node to be excluded
from the multicast session.

7. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 1 wherein the initial destination node entry is
predetermined.

8. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 1 further comprising receiving data intended
for transmittal to the identified destination nodes of the multicast session on an input port,
and wherein the initial destination node entry is determined based on the input port.

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9. (PREVIOUSLY PRESENTED) The method of claim 1 wherein the address for
entering the list is the destination node from which the data was received.

10. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 1 wherein the traversed destination node
entries are the identified destination nodes of the multicast session.

11. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 1 wherein destination node entries for a
plurality of multicast sessions are interleaved in a list, and wherein the destination node entries
for each one of the plurality of multicast sessions are circularly linked .

12. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 1 wherein each destination node entry
includes link information, and wherein the step of traversing the linked list comprises
traversing the linked list according to the link information at each destination node entry.

13. (ORIGINAL) The method of claim 12 wherein the link information comprises a
pointer at each destination node entry that points to another destination node entry such that
the plurality of destination node entries are circularly linked.

14. (CURRENTLY AMENDED) A method for identifying the destination nodes
for a multicast session in a network having a plurality of nodes, comprising:

forming a multicast group list comprising a physical address queue further comprising
a^circularly linked plurality of destination node entries, wherein each destination node entry
includes link information and an associated address for receiving multicast data;

receiving data intended for transmittal to the destination nodes of the multicast

session;

entering the list at an initial destination node entry as determined from the received

data;

traversing the list according to the link information for sending the multicast data to
the destination nodes;

determining when the traversing step returns to the initial destination node entry; and
terminating the traversing step prior to reaching the initial destination node.

15. (CURRENTLY AMENDED) An apparatus for identifying destination nodes of
a multicast session in a network having a plurality of nodes, comprising:

a circularly linked list comprising a physical address queue further comprising a
plurality of destination node entries, wherein the contents of each destination node entry
include an associated destination address and data transmission parameters;

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a processing engine for identifying an initial destination entry for entering the list and
for traversing the linked list until the initial destination node entry is reached to ; and

the processing engine terminating the traversing step prior to reaching the initial
destination node entry.

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